A much-needed convoy turned up from Bethlehem to-day with ammunition for us. We took our waggon down in the morning and filled it. A box of matches per man was also served out. In the evening came the joyful news that we were to start tomorrow, two days' fighting expected. Williams and I made a roaring fire of an ammunition box in honour of the occasion, and a grand supper of mealy-cakes and tea, and smoked and talked till late. Summing up our experiences, we agreed that we enjoyed the life thoroughly, but much preferred marching to sitting still. Both thoroughly fit and well, as nearly all have been since campaigning began. In numbers, I hear, we are twenty-two short of our full complement.
One thing that makes a great difference is that campaigning has become routine. One doesn't worry over little things, as one did in early days, when one dreamt of nose-bags, bridoons, muzzles, etc., and the awful prospect of losing something important or unimportant, and when one harnessed-up in a fever of anxiety, dreading that the order "hook in" would find one still fumbling for a strap in the dark, in oblivion of the hot coffee which would be missed cruelly later. In a score of little ways one learns to simplify things, save time, and increase comfort. Not that one ever gets rid of a strong sense of responsibility. Entire charge, day and night, of two horses and two sets of harness, is no light thing.
July 22.—Sunday.—Reveillé at six. Boot and saddle at 7.30; started at 8.30—a lovely day. Marched out about three miles with the brigade, and are now halted. An officer has just explained to the non-coms, what is going to happen. The Boer forces are in the mountains east of us, whence there are only three outlets, that is, passes (or neks, as the Dutch call them), one at each corner of a rough triangle. British columns are watching all these, Hunter, Paget, Clements, and Bruce Hamilton. Ours is called Slabbert's Nek, and to-day's move is a reconnaissance in force towards it, without likelihood of fighting. The delay here has been to allow every column to get into position, so that when an attack is made there may be no escape from the trap. The trap, of course, is a very big one, one corner, I believe, being at the Basuto border. Something like a whole army corps is engaged. It is most novel and unusual to know anything about what one is doing. It makes a marvellous difference to one's interest in everything, and I have often wondered why we are not told more. But I suppose the fact is that very few people know.
We halted while the mounted troops made a long reconnaissance, and then came back to camp. It clouded up in the evening, and about eight began to rain, and suddenly, with no warning, to blow a hurricane. I rushed to my harness, covered up my kit in it, seized my blankets and bolted for a transport-waggon, dived under it, tripping over the bodies of the Collar-maker sergeant and his allies, breathlessly apologized, and disposed myself as best I could. But the rain drove in, and there seemed always to be mules on my feet; so, when fairly wet through, I crept out and joined a circle at a great fire which similar unfortunates had built, where we cooked two camp-kettles full of mysteriously commandeered tea and porridge, and made very merry till reveillé at 4.30 in the morning.
[ CHAPTER VIII. ]
SLABBERT'S NEK AND FOURIESBERG.
July 23.—Harnessed up at 4.30, and marched out in a raw, cold fog, all wet, but very cheerful. While halting at the rendezvous to await our escort, there were great stories of the night, especially of a tempestuous scene under a big waggon-sheet crowded with irreconcilable interests. We marched straight towards the mountains, ten or twelve miles, I suppose, till we were pretty close up, and then Clements's two great lyddite five-inch guns came into position and fired at long range. They are called "Weary Willie" and "Tired Tim," and each is dragged by twenty-two splendid oxen. We soon moved on a mile or two farther, crossed one of the worst spruits I remember, climbed a very steep hill, and came into action just on its brow, firing at a distant ridge. All this time the infantry had been advancing on either flank in extended order.
(3.30 P.M.)—We and the 38th and the cow-guns, as they are called, have been raining shell on the Boer positions and on their guns. The situation, as I see it, is this: we are exactly opposite the mouth of the nek, stretching back into the mountains like a great grass road, bordered with battlements of precipitous rock, which at this end—the gate we are knocking at—swell out on either side into a great natural bastion of bare rock. On these are the Boer trenches, tier above tier, while their guns are posted on the lower ground between. It looks an impregnable position. The Royal Irish, I hear, are attacking the right hand bastion; the Munsters, I think, the left, and there is a continuous rattle of rifle-fire from both.
Our teams, waggons, and limbers, have been shell-dodging under the brow of the hill. They have fallen all around us, but never on us. One, which I saw fall, killed five horses straight off, and wounded the Yeomanry chap who was holding them. We have shifted position two or three times; it is windy, and very cold. A new and unpleasant experience in the shape of a pom-pom has come upon the scene. Far off you hear pom-pom-pom-pom-pom, five times, and directly afterwards, like an echo, pom-pom-pom-pom-pom in your neighbourhood, five little shells bursting over an area of about eighty yards, for all the world like a gigantic schoolboy's cracker. The new captain of the unlucky 38th has been hit in two places by one.
At the close the day was undecided; the infantry had taken some trenches, but were still face to face with others, and fire was hottest at sunset. But I believe the pom-pom was smashed up, and a big gun silenced, if not smashed. We bivouacked where we were, but desultory rifle-fire went on long after dark.